


The Fool and his Hierophant

by Child_of_Sin



Category: Persona 5
Genre: Aged-Up Character(s), Akira's thighs could kill a man, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Bi-Curiosity, Bisexuality, Body Worship, Boys Kissing, Denial of Feelings, Dubcon Kissing, Flirting, Fondling, French Kissing, Gay, Grinding, M/M, Neck Kissing, Not Canon Compliant, Older Man/Younger Man, Rare Pairings, Sexuality Crisis, Size Difference, Soulmate-Identifying Marks, Soulmates, Thighs, Timeskip, that man is Sojiro
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-11-24
Updated: 2019-04-12
Packaged: 2019-08-28 06:30:13
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,038
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16718121
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Child_of_Sin/pseuds/Child_of_Sin
Summary: That damn mark.He'd had it for years. The mark of his soulmate.A black masquerade mask.It had showed up on him when he was 20, just like anybody else. He'd assumed it was Wakaba, and when it wasn't her, he just assumed his soulmate was dead and gone, and thus covered the mark with his watch or his sleeves.He didn't particularlyneeda soulmate. And if his was gone, he was alright with it. Not like he knew them anyways.That is, until the troublemaking Phantom Thief that he'd cared for nearly an entire year strolls in, wearinghis markon his neck, asking for a cup of coffee.The universe has some sick sense of humor, doesn't it?





	1. Of All the Bars in All the Cafés in All of Japan...

**Author's Note:**

> Dadjiro good. Daddyjiro is also pretty great. (͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)
> 
> As on all my stories, a disclaimer: Everything and anything potentially triggering or upsetting is outlined in the tags. If anything there will make you angry, don't read this.
> 
> Dont tell people to kill themselves over fanfics. It's uncool.

The door to his cafe opened, and Sojiro sighed. It was getting late, and he was getting ready to close soon. He set down the cup he was drying.

"Ah, welcome to Leblanc...we're closing in an hour, so please, try not to lollygag-"

A chuckle, rich and smooth like caramel. "Heh...that any way to greet me, Sojiro? I'm back after three years and all you do is try to rush me out..."

Sojiro looked up in surprise. He'd recognize that voice anywhere.

The kid. Kurusu.

Akira.

"Well...it's good to see you, kid..." That was a little bit of an understatement. The proper phrasing would be 'God, I really missed you, ya little bastard.'

The man shook his head and sighed heavily. "I'm in college and yet you're still calling me a kid?"

Sojiro rest a hand on his hip. "You gonna scrutinize everything I say, or are you gonna sit down?"

Akira sat down on his stool. Yes, his stool. The one he'd sit at every morning as he dug into delicious curry while checking his daily messages. "Futaba and I talk pretty regularly, but I haven't had that luxury with you. How've you been? Things alright here?"

"Eh, boring as usual here in Yongen. Nothing much has changed since you left. A few of those shady government types monitored here and the house after you left, but after a few months they stopped coming by."

Akira frowned. "Yeah, Futaba told me about that. I'm sorry-"

Sojiro waved the younger man off, not even entertaining his apology. "No need to apologize. You and your friends did way too much for us all to even consider accepting an apology for dumbasses like them."

He smiled warmly up at the older man, and Sojiro turned around. "Now...I'm sure you want some coffee and curry, right? What brew do you want?"

"Eh...just Columbian."

Sojiro smirked and scooped out the beans. "Your favorite. Naturally."

As he prepared the coffee, Sojiro spoke again. "How are things going? At school I mean. Futaba's given me a little bit of story but I can only read so much from that girl."

"Oh, it's been going good. Difficult...but compared to what I was doing while I was here, it was pretty easy." He replied, grinning. Sojiro let out a bark of a laugh.

"I'll bet it was..." He continued with what he was doing.

Akira piped up, "The mark finally showed up."

Sojiro faltered. Just a tad. Just a bit, before returning to his task. "The...soul mark, you mean?"

"Yeah..." Akira said softly, fiddling with his watch.

Soul marks were key in helping a person find their soulmate. The first mark was a person's own. Everyone had a different one, in a different place, at different sizes and different colors. Personal marks always appeared during adolescence.

When you reached the age of 20, however, you received a new mark. This mark belonged to your soulmate. The one person on the entire planet who was completely and totally compatable with you, romantically, emotionally, and sexually. This mark itself appeared in random places and at random sizes. You may get your soulmate's mark as a small thing in an inconspicuous place, or you may get an ostentatious one plastered across your arms, legs, or even your face.

Sojiro's mark had been a thin, spindly tree. It was a fuchsia color, and was located right in the middle of his chest.

His soulmate, on the other hand, was a mysterious black masquerade mask, located on the inside of his wrist. 

Sojiro had always wondered what sort of person had such an enigmatic mark, and when he'd meet this person.

He thought it was Wakaba, but he was proven wrong. Her soul marks did not match his, and when she died, he could no longer bring himself to care about finding said soulmate.

"Ah. What's it look like?" Sojiro asked, more out of curiosity than anything.

"It's on the back of my neck, so I don't know that well myself. Someone in my college class said it was like...a pink tree?"

Sojiro's eye widened and his hands shook. "A...a pink t-tree?"

Akira nodded, resting his chin in his palm.

"Yeah. Wonder who's gotta mark like that out there.."

"I...what's your mark like?" No. There was no way. No way in _hell_.

"Hm? Mine?" Akira blinked. "Oh...uh...it's a...mask? Sorta. Like a weird looking half mask. Actually..." He stood to his feet and began unbuttoning his jacket. "I could just show you..." He shouldered his jacket off, and laid it across the stool. He then rolled up the sleeve of his dress shirt...

The world around Sojiro seemed to slow down, washing out into an abstract blur of color and sound, localized around the skin of Akira's bicep.

 

 

Because there was his soulmate's mark, clear as day, black mask standing out against pale, creamy skin.


	2. Spilled Coffee

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sojiro has officially decided that the universe just. Hates him.

"No way..."

"Hm? S-Sojiro? What's..."

The older man looked into Akira's eyes with such dire seriousness that the younger man's slight smile melted away. "That's my mark."

Akira blinked, mouth forming an 'o' shape. "That's...th-that's..." He looked down at his arm. "...we're soulmates?" His voice, usually so stoic and demure, now betrayed an almost childlike wonder at the idea.

Sojiro stared at the counter, mind whirling. "Yes...yeah, I guess we are." He grit his teeth. "Is...Is this some sort of joke?"

Akira frowned. "I wouldn't joke about something like that."

The café owner leaned forward on the counter, hands on his head. "No, just...what kind of sick universe is this, huh?"

The younger man's grey eyes stared down at his hands. "Is it really that terrible?" He murmured.

Sojiro looked up at Akira. "Look, I'm...I'm  _straight,_ kid. Being around you was the most time I'd spent in the company of another man in... _decades._ We _can't_ be soulmates."

Akira looked hurt, eyes darting to the floor. "...I see."

The tension in the air was thick, suffocating.

"I...should go..." Akira said finally, voice hoarse, and low, as if the younger man was struggling not to cry.

Something, a vaguely protective feeling, welled up in the older man. Something he'd only felt about Akira when he'd thought the teen would've been hurt, like when he'd been at the café and heard the news that the leader of the Phantom Thieves had committed suicide while in custody. 

"Akira-" Sojiro reached out a hand towards him.

Akira pulled away slightly, then got up from where he sat. "No, no. I-It's...it's alright. It's f-fine. I..." He swallowed thickly as he began to put on his jacket. Not here. He couldn't cry here, not in front of Sojiro. "I understand. Y-You're right, it must be a mistake."

Sojiro could practically hear the pain in Akira's voice, and that feeling of protectiveness only seemed to strengthen. "I never said-"

"You didn't  _have_ to." Akira snapped, turning away. His posture sagged slightly, as if he was tired. "But...it's a-alright. I'm sorry. I didn't mean to make this visit so unpleasant."

"No...I-"

"Goodbye, Sojiro. It...it was nice seeing you. Please tell Futaba I said hi, alright?" Akira pushed his way out the door.

"Kid, _wait_ -!"

The door closed, and Sojiro's hand slowly sank back down to the counter.

* * *

"Why didn't you want to take me inside?" Morgana asked indignantly, the cat nimberly jumping back up onto the passenger seat of the car. "I wanted to see Boss too!"

The cat's annoyance faded, however, as he noticed that Akira's shoulders began to shake. "Joker? Are you alright?" The cat asked, using the man's former Thief name to indicate his worry.

Akira let out a soft, stifled noise, and Morgana moved up to nose at Akira's arm. A soft paw patted at the man's back as he began to sob into his hands.

"What happened, Joker? Is Sojiro alright?"

"I...he...we..." Akira rubbed across his face with the sleeve of his jacket. Bawling and rubbing his tears with his sleeve...he felt like a primary schooler. "We're _soulmates_ , Morgana." He choked out.

The cat cocked his head. "That's that human thing I've heard people talk about sometimes, right? What's it mean, anyway?"

"It means...a soulmate's the one person in the world that you're utterly compatible with. Romantically, emotionally, physically...it's someone that you're eventually compelled to find some day, to be with for the rest of your lives."

"That sounds very...romantic. Almost like a fairytale. If that's the case with you and Sojiro, then why are you outside, crying in the car? Shouldn't you be in there...doing whatever it is soulmates do?"

Akira let out a harsh, halfhearted laugh. Morgana had a way of speaking that made certain things he did sound absolutely pathetic.

"Morgana, he's...he's not...not interested in men. As in, he wants nothing to do with me in that way. Us being soulmates is a...mistake or something..."

Morgana frowned, blue eyes narrowing. "Maybe he's not totally sure?"

"He sounded pretty sure." Akira replied bitterly, before leaning back to stare up at the roof of his car. "I don't get why the hell nature decided to play such a cruel joke on us. Haven't we both been through enough crap to have things go right for a while?"

Morgana didn't respond.

' _Bzzt!'_

Akira jumped at the feeling of his phone buzzing in his pocket. He fished it out.

_You have (1) unread message from Ryuji_

Akira huffed. "Not right now."

Morgana cocked his head. "Who is it?"

"Ryuji. Don't really feel like having a chat with him right now, though. Or really anyone." Akira put his hands on the wheel. "Let's go. I need to book a room."

* * *

"So~jiroooo! Oi, what're you doing here still?" 

Sojiro looked up as the door swung open. Futaba walked through, a bounce in her step.

"Futaba..." he muttered. This day just got better and better.

"Sojiro? It's been like...20 minutes since you were supposed to close. I was waiting for you to come back so you could sign something for class but..." She trailed off as she got a good look at the older man's face. "...you look _depressed_. Did that one guy with that huge mole that never shuts up come back around?"

Sojiro shook his head in disbelief. How in hell was he going to explain to his teenaged daughter that he just got into what amounted to a lover's spat with his soulmate, who just happened to be the man that was like a surrogate brother to her?

"...it's...nothing, Futaba."

The girl rolled her eyes. "Ugh, are we seriously back to not telling me anything going on with you?" She folded her arms. "You're lucky I don't have this place bugged anymore."

"Futaba, _**please**_." Sojiro said, tone clipped. "I don't want to discuss this with you. I'll be home in a minute, just...I need time. Please."

Futaba frowned heavily. "I..." She sighed. "Fine, fine. I'm heading home."

"Thank you." Sojiro responded weakly, pinching the bridge of his nose as he felt a headache coming on.

Futaba left the shop, the door ringing behind her, and Sojiro groaned.

"What the hell. What the actual _hell."_ Sojiro muttered.

He knew the situation he was in wasn't one in a million. There had been numerous reports over the years, about certain people finding themselves inexplicably soulbonded to someone that by all accounts they shouldn't be attracted to.

Supposedly straight men and women suddenly finding themselves mated with a same sex partner wasn't exceedingly rare. It was often a case of bi-curiosity, or even just flexibility on their part.

But Sojiro just  _couldn't._ He wasn't attracted to men. Had he done stupid, questionable things as an adolescent? Sure, but who hadn't? It didn't mean he'd suddenly developed an attraction to men just because his soulmate was apparently a guy.

And then there was the matter of age. Sojiro was at  _least_ twice Akira's age. It just...wouldn't work. No way in hell.

There had to be some sort of mistake here...

 

...yet a niggling feeling at the back of his mind told him that wasn't very accurate whatsoever.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> After 495 years, I return.

**Author's Note:**

> every rarepair needs a little love, amiright??


End file.
